Quantcast

Friction in rear hub caused by QR skewer?

TCoop924

Monkey
Jul 29, 2002
117
0
WA
I spent last weekend rebuilding the drive train of my Voodoo Dambala 29er for the upcoming summer. I took the rear cassette apart for a thorough cleaning, cleaned the gunk out of the rear derailleur, lubed the chain, yadda yadda yadda. I mount the rear wheel and re-align my disc brakes (there is no brake rub that I can hear or see), crank down on the QR, and give the wheel a spin for measure. Everything seems a-OK, except the wheel comes to a halt rather rapidly - in less than five seconds. Well, this clearly strikes me as odd. I remove the skewer and give the wheel a spin and, voila, the thing spins normally. I crank the QR down again and it reintroduces the friction and stops the wheel quickly.

I have had this same QR set for many years and many bikes...it just kept getting switched over. One thing I have noticed on the Dambala is that I have to twist the knob end of the QR further than other bikes (i.e., the skewer actually comes out the other side of the knob rather than sitting flush). So, my question -- is there something I can do to prevent the QR from introducing this friction into the system? Or am I missing something and it is another component that just seems to create the friction when the QR is tightened?
 

TCoop924

Monkey
Jul 29, 2002
117
0
WA
Follow-up: I did some internet research and came upon the issue of side-loaded friction based on over tightening the QR. That seems like one possibility. However, I really am attempting to only tighten the QR down minimally to prevent this and the point at which is starts to feel "friction-y" stills seems pretty loose in my book for a QR; definitely looser than I am used to on my other bikes (or this frame before my rebuild).